1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a printed circuit board, and more particularly to a flexible printed circuit board for use in a compact apparatus such as a camera.
2. Description of the Related Art
In this field of art, the display integrated circuit 3 (hereinafter, referred to as display IC), and the display device 6 or 7 for the display unit of the camera have been conventionally mounted on the same printed circuit board 2, on which a control IC 4 and a photometric IC 5 are also mounted, as shown in FIG. 1. However, with the use of a liquid crystal device LCD in both the display 6 on the camera body and the display 7 in the finder in addition to the increase in display informations required in recent years, the display circuit pattern and other circuit patterns have become intricate on the flexible printed circuit board, with the display circuit patterns getting in the way of other circuit patterns or even limiting the ability to lay out a display circuit on the printed circuit board. As shown in FIG. 1 for example, the circuit pattern connecting display IC 3 to on-body display element 6 and in-finder display element 7 would intersect the circuit pattern connecting control IC 4 to terminal pattern 2B for the release SW and terminal patterns 2C for various setting switches. Designing display functions freely has become impossible due to the above mentioned difficulty in laying out circuit patterns.
On the other hand display integrated circuit 3 has been conventionally of a flat package type F as shown in FIG. 2, and is mounted on the flexible printed circuit board 2 by means of solder H. This has caused a bulkiness of the display unit of the camera.
Further, in this field of art, there are various demands to improve the structure of the printed circuit board itself in view of its compactness, solidity and reliability.